Phoolka Joins BJP; Bomb Blast in Chandigarh

April

2026

Human rights lawyer and author, senior advocate Harvinder Singh Phoolka—the face of the legal battle for justice for the victims of the 1984 Sikh genocide—joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on 1 Apr. Phoolka was earlier elected to the Panjab Legislative Assembly in 2017 as an Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) member and served as the Leader of Opposition (LoP). However, since LoP is a cabinet rank and considered an office of profit, the Delhi Bar Council objected to him fighting the 1984 Sikh genocide cases. Phoolka quit his post to fight the Sajjan Kumar and other cases. He formally quit AAP in July 2018. Though the BJP has brought in Phoolka to strengthen its presence in Panjab, the political impact of this move may not be linear, as strong apprehensions about the BJP persist within the larger Sikh community. In his press conference, Phoolka praised the BJP to the skies, which raised questions among Sikhs about him. For the Sikh community, decades-old legacy issues concerning both the Sikhs and Panjab remain unresolved. Some of those issues are: release of Sikh prisoners, opening of the Kartarpur Sahib corridor closed since Operation Sindoor (vermillion mark) a semi-war with Pakistan in May 2025, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee elections, release of movie Punjab ‘95 based on an earlier human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra’s enforced disappearance and extrajudicial killing, opening the Wagah border for trade with Pakistan, effective steps to curtail religious conversions in Panjab, and Minimum Support Price for all crops in India. To earn credibility with Sikh voters who dominate in 70–75 constituencies in Panjab, Phoolka will have to solve some of these issues. Parallely, on 1 Apr, a low-intensity explosion took place outside the BJP office in Chandigarh. The banned outfit Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) claimed responsibility for the attack. On 4 Apr, Panjab’s Director General of Police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav said that Panjab’s intelligence wing, in a joint operation with Chandigarh police, had successfully solved the grenade attack case with the arrest of five accused involved in the incident. Preliminary investigations have revealed that the module was backed by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence and operated under the directions of foreign-based handlers located in Portugal and Germany (earlier coverage).